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New St. Louis. 



Its Causes, Needs, and Duties. 



By S. Waterhouse of Washington University. 
(second edition.) 

The recent improvements of St. Louis seem to me to be 
largely due to the suggestions of domestic and foreign 
travel. Every year increasing numbers of our citizens visit 
the chief cities of America and Europe. These tours afford 
opportunities for intelligent comparison. Formerly the con- 
trasts did not gratify our local pride. It was seen that many 
smaller cities, both at home and abroad, surpassed St. Louis 
in the attractiveness and convenience of their public improve- 
ments. Doubtless the press had already acquainted these 
travelers with the facts which they witnessed, but personal 
observation is more vividly impressive than the most graphic 
description. The St. Louis tourist may have read of the 
prosperity of far distant Washington, but when he sees in 
young Seattle finer rows of buildings than any which a 
metropolis ten times its size possesses, the startling spectacle 
suggests unwelcome contrasts, in the earlier years, the 
statements of the comparatively limited number of our 
citizens who had seen the superiority of other cities were 
received with popular distrust ; but latterly, when tens of 
thousands of our population have become familiar with the 
great cities of the United States and Europe, a spirit of in- 
telligent emulation has actively endeavored to promote the 
advancement of St. Louis. A general recognition of the 
needs of this city led to an organized effort to supply them. 
It was the charm of English pleasure-grounds that suggested 
to Henry Shaw the creation of our beautiful Tower Grove 
Park. It was doubtless an observance of the admirable 
pavement of European capitals that led to the improvement 
of our streets. The finer structures which now embellish 
St. Louis are partly attributable to a spirit of competition 
with rival cities. 



COM' 



But there are historic reasons for the greater readiness 
with which St. Louis now takes hints. The early French 
and Spanisli residents of St. Louis preferred the enjoyments 
of leisure to the profits of industry. Indifferent to the luxu- 
ries of wealth and the gratifications of ambition, they lived 
lives of careless ease and social gaiety. After the cession 
of Louisiana to the United States, slavery fostered a similar 
inertness. The conditions under which most of our richer 
classes lived were unfavorable to the development of enter- 
prise. Boys who are reared in habits of entire dependence 
upon the services of others seldom become men of self- 
reliant energy. The fact that there were in the slave 
States many noble examples of public spirit and commer- 
cial activity does not disprove the general truth that 
the love of edse which servitude begets does not pro- 
mote the development of an independent and resourceful 
manhood. The luxurious indolence which bondage fostered 
enervated the masters. Many of our old families brought 
up under servile institutions were content with the safe 
enjoyment of their wealth. The influences under which 
they were reared tended to withhold them from any 
undertaking that might endanger their fortunes. This 
lack of enterprise has always been a serious hindrance to 
the progress of St. Louis. Men of opulence and social 
position were naturally regarded as popular leaders, and if 
they failed to aid proposed improvements, the projects were 
generally abandoned. The faster growth of the States on 
the same parallel with Missouri can only be ascribed to the 
greater economic energy which free institutions develop. 
St. Louis was long benumbed by the torpor of slavery. 

But now this lethargy is quickening into vigorous life. 
A generation has grown up under the inspiriting influences 
of freedom. The emancipation of the slaves was also the 
enfranchisement of their masters. The discipline of ambi- 
tious and self-reliant industry naturally tends to produce 
men of enterprise and public spirit. The manly training 
which has freed them from the conservatism that resisted 
every step of municipal progress prompts them to adopt with 
alacrity every wise innovation. Actuated by these broader 
influences, the citizens of St. Louis are now more actively 
co-operating for the advancement of their municipal interests. 



— 3 — 

The signs of public progress are agreeably numerous. The 
improvement of our streets is a gratifying evidence of 
advancement. In the work of reconstruction, new methods 
and better materials have been used. No city in any land is 
better paved than the central portion of St. Louis. Of its 
360 miles of pavement, one-quarter has already been rebuilt. 
On our main business thoroughfares, 45 miles of the old 
macadam have been supplanted by granite blocks. The 
progress of reconstruction will be as fast as available funds 
will permit. The rapid extension of granitoid sidewalks also 
enhances the elegance and convenience of our avenues. 
Lines of electric or cable cars run to every part of the city. 
All of our streets are nightly illuminated with the brilliancy 
of electric lights. The business houses which the merchants 
of St. Louis are now erecting would not discredit the great 
capitals of Europe. The depot which the Terminal Railroad 
Association is now building in this city will be one of the 
largest and finest stations in the world. The cost of site and 
structure will be more than $ i ,600,000. Our annual Fair and 
Exposition are the best in the United States. If the electric 
splendors of our fall festivities do not equal in extent, they 
rival in brilliancy the illuminations of Paris. The capitalists 
of St. Louis are now erecting a hotel on which considerably 
more than ^1,000,000 will be spent. The amount of our 
wholesale trade is annually expanding to larger aggregates. 
St. Louis now makes more than ;$ 10,000,000 worth of boots 
and shoes a year. In this industry, its rivalry endangers the 
supremacy of Lynn. Its total annual sales of the products 
of home and eastern shoe factories amount to nearly 
^40,000,000. Our local industries are steadily increasing in 
number and productive value. In the manufacture of car- 
riages, beer, tobacco, stoves, ranges, stamped ware, and 
heavy machinery St. Louis stands in the front rank of 
American cities. The wages of the 86,000 artisans who are 
now employed in the workshops of this city are about 
;^ 50,000,000 a year, and the annual value of our local manu- 
factures are more than $200,000,000. In 1892, the sales of 
city real estate were upwards of $60,000,000, and the total 
taxable property of St. Louis was $284,500,000. Last year, 
the clearances of our banks reached the vast aggregate of 
$1,231,570,000. In 1892, the number of buildings erected 



in St. Louis was nearly 5,500, and their actual value exceeded 
$25,000,000. The total width of the lots on which these 
structures were built is equal to 570 city blocks. Our 
municipal records show that a large town is added to this 
city every year. The preceding figures indicate the metro- 
politan greatness of St. Louis and the new inspirations that 
now animate its progress. 

Such are a few of the proofs that St. Louis is now keeping 
step with the march of American progress. The lagging 
pace of former years has quickened into a vigorous stride. 
To pass from a discussion of the causes of this awakened 
energy to a consideration of the best means of utilizing it is 
a natural transition. 

In these days of alert and active competition, commerce 
needs every facility for its transaction. Our merchants 
complain of unjust discriminations in railroad freights, and 
of inadequate terminal accommodations. Men not engaged 
in mercantile pursuits might perhaps think that the redress 
of such grievances was the exclusive business of dealers 
whose interests were directly affected by rates of transpor- 
tation and promptness of delivery. But whatever injures 
the commerce of St. Louis impairs the prosperity of each of 
its citizens. The welfare of every member of this com- 
munity is measurably dependent upon the success of our 
commerce and manufactures, and an increase of our muni- 
cipal wealth promotes the interests of every business man. 
The vigorous co-operation of our fellow-citizens would soon 
compel railroad corporations to establish a tariff of equal 
rates for transportation, and to provide ample terminal 
facilities. 

Sagacity, sound judgment, and an ability to read character 
are the essential elements of business success, but the keen 
rivalries of trade force merchants to study minor economies. 
Mechanical appliances for the cheap transfer of merchandise 
are no insignificant factors of mercantile thrift. The cost 
of long drayage is often fatal to profits. Some of our 
wholesale grocery stores furnish an apt illu.stration of my 
meaning. Situated near a trunk line, with a branch track 
running into the buildings, they can receive or ship produce 
at the lowest possible cost. hi competition with such 
facilities, houses remote from a railroad would labor under 



u;rave disadvantages. The example of our grocers conveys 
a hint to all dealers in bulky commodities. They should 
locate their storehouses near a railroad, and avail themselves 
of every convenience which steam or electricity affords for 
the handling of their wares. 

An intelligent self-interest will actively encourage the 
diversification of our manufacturing industries. St. Louis is 
a natural seat of the productive arts. Situated in the centre 
of one of the largest and richest valleys in the world, it has, 
by means of its vast system of tributary rail and river, 
equal facilities for the cheap importation of fuel and raw 
materials, and for the easy distribution of the manufactured 
products. A city in whose immediate vicinity there is found 
an unlimited abundance of agricultural and mineral resources 
ought to become a great industrial capital. Manufacturers in 
every branch of mechanical art ought to be invited to locate 
their works in the northern suburbs of St. Louis. 
Attracted by the inducement of cheap sites and by 
an assurance of municipal fair-dealing, they would be led by 
larger opportunities for success to establish their factories in 
this great centre of production and consumption. St. Louis 
should follow the example of Pullman, and provide economic 
conveniences for the skilled artisans who are so important 
factors of its prosperity. Low rents for comfortable houses 
and cheap fares from home to workshop are deserved 
encouragements to the artificers who will upbuild the 
industrial greatness of the city. Agriculture, commerce, 
and manufactures are the three great sources of material 
development. If, with an equally efficient co-operation, 
these wealth-producing elements promote the growth of St. 
Louis, our city cannot fail to be greatly prosperous. But, 
in our industrial progress, the conditions of most rapid 
advancement will not permit manufactures to lag behind 
her sisters. 

Like other western cities that use bituminous coal for fuel, 
St. Louis has been subject to the annoyance of smoke, but 
recently an association has been formed for the express 
purpose of abating this cause of public discomfort. The 
organization of this company, which includes more than 
2,000 of the principal business men of the city, is both 
an evidence of the progressive spirit of St. Louis and an 



— G — 

assurance that our skies will soon be cleared from the gloom 
that has been wont to obscure them. 

Laclede sagaciously foresaw the possible greatness of the 
trading-post which he founded, but none of his fellow- 
colonists, or their immediate successors, were endowed with 
an equal forecast. Consequently the first streets were 
better suited to the limited needs of a small French village 
than to the spacious requirements of a great American me- 
tropolis. It is now seemingly impracticable to rectify the 
pardonable mistakes of the first settlers. Old St. Louis will 
have to bear the disfigurement of narrow, crooked, and 
irregular streets. But now it needs little foresight to see 
that St. Louis is destined to be one of the great cities of the 
world, and henceforth a repetition of the errors of the early 
colonists will be inexcusable. The growth of St. Louis will 
be more rapid in the future than it has been in the past. 
The total foreign commerce of the United States is now about 
$1,800,000,000, but our domestic trade is eighteen times as 
large. The babe is now born who will live to see the dawn 
of the twenty-first century. Statisticians, basing their cal- 
culations upon a careful study of past rates of increase and 
■making reductions for every probable retardation of growth, 
have estimated that, in the year 2000, the number of people 
in the United States will be more than 380,000,000. As the 
country grows richer, its commercial wants will multiply 
more rapidly than its population does. But, at the same rate 
of enlargement, the internal exchanges of the United States 
will, at the end of the next century, greatly exceed 1^300,- 
000,000,000. These enormous aggregates will seem, to 
minds that have not examined the cautiously exhaustive 
investigations upon which the figures rest, to be gross 
exaggerations. But exact statistics, even if attainable, are 
not essential to my argument. Lessen the amounts to one- 
third of the preceding estimates, and even then, after a 
reduction wholly unwarranted by scientific computation, the 
total population and home trade of the United States will be 
vast. Of this commerce, St. Louis will enjoy its rightful 
proportion. With its 16,000 miles of river navigation and its 
radial lines of railroad to the circumference of the country, 
this city will be the great commercial centre of the Mississippi 
Valley. With its natural and artificial facilities for the 



— 7 — 

distribution of commodities, St. Louis can not evade mercan- 
tile greatness. The large manufactories of the East are 
migrating to the midland valley of the West. In order to 
save the cost of long transportation, industrial works are 
following the westward movement of population. The valley 
which is the center of manufactures, population, and agri- 
cultural production cannot fail to be prosperous, in the 
immense expansion of trade which the needs of increasing 
millions will cause, St. Louis will actively participate. As it 
is now certain that this city is destined to become a great 
metropolis, all of our future improvements ought to con- 
tribute to its magnificence. Decoration is not inconsistent 
with utility. Beauty does not impair the usefulness of 
streets, parks, or public buildings. The citizens of St. Louis 
have never fully appreciated the financial value of urban 
embellishment. Imperial power has lavished scores of millions 
upon the adornment of Paris and Vienna, and now these 
beautiful capitals derive a large and permanent revenue from 
the throngs of travelers who are attracted by their splendor. 
if our aldermen cannot equal the prodigality of empetors, 
they can, by the exercise of their municipal authority, do 
much to prevent the disfigurement and to promote the 
ornamentation of St. Louis. They can prohibit the erection 
of manufactories in the residence portion of the city, regulate 
the width of new streets and prescribe the style of public 
buildings. They can remove the unsightly telegraph poles 
that now deform our avenues, and place in subways the 
electric wires which now endanger the lives of our citizens 
and obstruct the efficiency of the Fire Department. In 
efforts to beautify St. Louis, all of its inhabitants ought 
cordially to join. The attractions of fine hotels and 
theatres, of elegant public and private edifices, of fairs and 
expositions, of festivals and pageants, of picturesque and 
tastefully adorned parks, of broad, clean, well paved, and 
tree-shaded streets will not only gratify our own citizens, but 
will also draw to the city such crowds of visitors as will in 
time repay the cost of the embellishments. 

Such are some of the improvements which the new social 
forces of St. Louis ought to make. Measures so essential to 
the welfare of the city public spirit and the harmonious 
co-operation of our citizens and municipal authorities could 



— 8 — 

easily accomplish. Our trust that they will not prove faith- 
less to their civic duties ought not to be an instance of 
misplaced confidence. 

In all ages, the benefactions of wealth have blessed man- 
kind. The progress of civilization, with all its grand 
charities and beneficent institutions, is largely due to a 
philanthropic use of riches. But the pursuit of opulence for 
its own sake is not an ennobling occupation. Mere com- 
mercial success is not a proof of high refinement. But the 
thoughtful and generous care which the people of St. Louis 
take of their schools, libraries, art galleries, and institutions 
of higher learning is a gratifying proof that they do not 
regard material prosperity as the criterion of true greatness. 



St. Louis, July i, 1893. 



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